


isn't it lovely?

by WinchesterBurger



Series: AnderPerry Week 2019 [1]
Category: Dead Poets Society (1989)
Genre: AnderPerry Week 2019, Angst, Autumn, Charlie is a great friend, Inspired By Tumblr, M/M, Sad, Sunrises, Todd Needs A Hug, beach
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-25
Updated: 2019-02-25
Packaged: 2019-11-05 15:33:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17921543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WinchesterBurger/pseuds/WinchesterBurger
Summary: You spend most of your days alone though – trying to find fitting rhymes to the poem you’re currently working on, or reading a new book you found in the local bookstore. It’s a good life, filled with letters and words you never get bored with, solitary and peaceful in the way you always wanted.[ first day, "beach" ]





	isn't it lovely?

**Author's Note:**

> I've always wanted to make something for you guys - this movie is wonderful and y'all so talented and kind! I truly feel at home in this fandom.
> 
> And yes, I sure like Todd depressed.

You like the beach, but only in autumn.

Days are warm enough to let you take your boots off and walk on the sand without freezing your toes off, yet cold enough to keep tourists away. You’re alone, if you exclude the retirees who stroll past you, and individual people taking their dogs on a walk. The sunrise here is nothing like the sunrise you were used to watching during your days in Welton, but you don’t miss the Academy. You like solitude and lack of school noises, though you don’t think you could live without your old friends.

Surely, you keep in touch with Meeks and Pittsie, and sometimes you get calls from Knox and Chris, inviting you for dinner or asking you to stay over the weekend with them. You usually accept their offers – you feel at home with them, chatting quietly over a cup of tea or taking care of their children. The kids adore you, you know that. They call you “uncle Toddie” and Chris likes to mention that they can never wait for you, always ask when you’ll be back with some new stories. You’re a writer now and you never run out of short tales about everything and nothing, trains of words that can entertain the little Overstreets for hours.

You spend most of your days alone though – trying to find fitting rhymes to the poem you’re currently working on, or reading a new book you found in the local bookstore. It’s a good life, filled with letters and words you never get bored with, solitary and peaceful in the way you always wanted. The only person that you share it with is Charlie, and it’s some kind of a joke, because Charlie is cheerful and smiling, and you’re a dull hermit that never tries to start a conversation. 

You feel him sit beside you, take off his jacket and slip if over your sweater. He’s frowning when you look at him with a question in your eyes, but his stare is fixed on the rising sun.

“You’re trembling. The last time we went sunrise watching you caught cold and didn’t move from your house for a week,” Dalton mumbles and if you didn’t know him, you’d think the man was angry, but years brought you two together and made you understand each other with a single glance. You let a small smile colour your lips as you wrap your fingers around the lapels of Charlie’s jacket and tighten it over your still lithe frame. You never got around to bulk up after leaving the Academy and graduating from college, in contrast to most of your classmates. Every time you see Gerard, he encourages you to eat what looks like half of his fridge and you always comply, not wanting anyone to worry too much. 

You look away from Charlie’s features and focus on the orange sun, squinting as waves mirror its glimmers and hit your eyes. It’s beautiful, it makes you hear new rhymes flowing through your mind and you almost reach for the small leather notebook you always carry in the pocket of your pants, but you can’t bring yourself to do it at the same time. You know what you’ll find in there and you don’t want to see it right now. It’s a good moment, only you, your old friend, and your head filled with memories too good to truly belong to you.

“I took Daisy out for a dinner last week,” Charlie says after a while, a smile in his voice, and you’re happy for him, you really are, but your heart aches and stomach twists at the memory of the worst morning in your life; of cold snow under your hands and in your mouth, and the frozen surface of the lake, the only listener to your cries and screams as you fell down on your knees on the wooden platform. 

“She seemed nice,” you murmur a second too late, recalling the only time you’ve seen her, but Charlie doesn’t seem to notice. “You could bring her over some day.”

“She’s very talkative,” Charlie starts carefully. “I’m not sure if you’d enjoy her company.”

You smile weakly at the sun – Charlie cares about you, you can hear it in his voice. You really appreciate it, but you’re an adult, you don’t need him walking on eggshells around you. You don’t mention it though. 

“We’ll never know unless we try.”

You leave short after, both shuddering from cold of the morning and an ever colder breeze. You fasten all the buttons of Charlie’s jacket during your walk back home – you try to give it back to him, but he looks ready to fight you just to make you keep it, so you fall quiet. You thrust it into his arms when you reach your house and almost slam the door in front of his nose, immediately wanting to open it back and apologize, but you stop yourself. Charlie won’t feel offended, you know it. You’re as insecure as you were back in Wellton, that’s one of many things that haven’t changed.

This morning you take out your favourite pen and a sheet of paper, make yourself a cup of tea. You sit at the table in your little kitchen, just under the window, and when the nib of your pen touches the paper, the only thing that comes to your mind is the first morning without Neil’s breath in the air around you. 

**Author's Note:**

> come yell at me at my dps tumblr [@a blanket of truth](https://hear-my-barbaric-yawp.tumblr.com/)  
> if you wanna see more of my writing [@someonefromthere](https://someonefromthere.tumblr.com/)


End file.
